“Critical point of drift. Anxiety re getting through gap between Elephant Island and King George… At daylight, what appeared to be at first an immense berg proved to be an island… The way to the land is jammed by treacherous pack moving rapidly by tides, winds and currents so as to be absolutely unsafe and impassable. Would that it would but open up. The pack is bristling with life; seals, penguins and birds of wing, whilst the incessant blowing of blue and killer whales, I may simile to a railway yard chock-full of engines blowing off at high pressure. One may observe killers porting in the pools, with their triangular dorsal above water or see their alligator-like heads peer above the floe in a quest of game…”